Just like that, the spotlight that has besieged Major League Baseball for years now fell upon the NHL. Just how serious did the NHL take looking into these charges? If you asked from Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd, according to an incredible story from Sports Illustrated’s David Epstein, you might be caught off guard.

After the arrest of Nagel, says Judd, “the NHL head of security was more concerned about how we got jurisdiction to arrest him [in Virginia].”

“I don’t know whether the NHL has a steroid issue or not,” Judd says, “but they certainly are very uncomfortable with us asking questions about it.”

To be clear here, no Capitals players failed any drug tests and players are tested a lot during the season. During the off-season and playoffs, however, players are not tested. The Capitals and the NHL both issued statements declaring there were no problems at all and that they’d help out investigators. That said, the Sheriff isn’t happy and that can’t bode well for the league. Just ask Major League Baseball about that.

It should be noted that many players have been tested in the offseason as part of the Olympic drug testing. I’m not sure if players have to be tested for the World Championships.
I’m not saying the NHL is %100 clean. That would be naive, there are plenty of ways of beating these test as past cases have shown.